Dan Fox's article 'A Serious Business', is a witty and believable plunge at the awkward question 'what does it mean to be a professional artist?' It's a question worth writing about again, because of the current pandemonium surrounding the credit crunch. Fox identifies the misconception that national bankruptcy will allow for a new, and naïve arcadia of artistic practice, free from the fetid world of media frenzied, consumer friendly art elite.
Young artists, i.e. my pals, who have and haven't been to art school, I think, are faced with a difficult choice. To survive as a practicing artist, you either have to align yourself with the uber rich patron, or the trust fund of a public art gallery. Neither is wrong, only both methods of upkeep perpetuate the museum establishment, and the non-threatening consumer radicalism that I think has over dominated the contemporary art market of late. The choice isn't even a new one, but I think the current economic climate has shoved it back in the limelight.
Brands such as 'authenticity' have become awkward, and I would argue invalid. But it still holds a fascination for artists and critics alike. It's no big secret that many artists, that produce important works, come from bourgeois backgrounds which allow them to survive. Although YBA's broke the barrier on this front, they are now the middle aged British artists, with no iconic and outspoken group having risen above the white noise of the media frenzy to take their place.
Unfortunately the price of a garret is only on the up, and it makes you wonder how this will change not only the type of artwork produced, but also accessed on a mass scale by the art viewing public. Will Gilbert and George's 'professionalism' or the more uncouth tradition of hustling for patronage by Windam Lewis dominate the way artists remain artists in the next few years.
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